Another weekend, another bridesmaid event for me!

Last Friday I headed to Chattanooga, TN for Katie’s bachelorette weekend.  Katie and I met in elementary school (woo Braelinn Stars!) and grew up playing soccer together.  Even though she went to UGA (go Jackets!), I still visited her a lot, and was pumped when she moved even closer to me, in Savannah, after college.  Last March we were in Savannah for Katie and Kyle’s engagement, so it was fun to get the group together again for a girls weekend… and most importantly, sky diving.

Everyone got in at different times on Friday night, so we cooked tacos, made margaritas and hung out until everyone got to our sweet condo overlooking the river.  We headed to a British pub for a few drinks before coming home for the night.  Check out the view from our place..

Saturday was the big day — all Katie wanted to do for her bachelorette party was go skydiving.  If you want to stand next to her on her wedding day, then you’ve gotta jump outta a plane with her.  I thought that seemed reasonable, but I was one of the few girls that had been sky diving before.

Eight of us (including Katie’s brother Billy who drove up) signed our waivers and got harnessed up by the guys at Chattanooga Skydiving Company.  We were split into 2 groups, and in the plane we went.  The first group (Katie, Emily, Stephanie and myself) were lucky enough to have some competition jumpers in the plane with us, so we got an extra 2,000 ft of altitude to jump from for free!  Once the pros were out of the plane, the four of us (and the instructors attached to our backs) moved toward the door and jumped out of the plane, one by one.

Some quick skydiving stats –>  Most tandems jump from around 12,500 feet.  Since we were lucky, we jumped from around 14,500 feet, and got another 30 seconds or so of free fall.  During free fall you’ll typically travel ~122mph.  Once the parachute is deployed, you’ll slow down and it’ll take another 5 minutes or so until you’re back on the ground.  Overall, it’s about a 15-20 minute trip from take off to landing!

After our sky diving adventure, we headed back to Chattanooga for pizza, beer, and a nap.  When we had all recovered, we walked to Big River Grille for dinner, then Southside Social for drinks.  Southside Social is this awesome building full of activities: bowling, ping pong, bocce ball on the patio — basically a 2 story Alley with tvs everywhere, which was great to catch the end of the UK / ND game (RIP my bracket and winnings).

Well the 2nd story of Southside Social overlooks a trampoline park… and what did Katie want to do next?  Yup. We went trampolining.  Imagine 12 girls in dresses jumping around like they’re 5 years old, playing ultimate dodgeball, and that’s basically what we did for an hour until the place closed.  It was awesome.

Not many bachelorette weekends include skydiving and a trampoline park, but Katie isn’t your average bride.  All of us had a blast this past weekend and are already looking forward to the wedding in a month!

PS – If you have a long drive ahead of you, I highly recommend listening to Serial to pass the time.  I started and finished the season during my drive and loved it.  Do you think he did it?

And finally — you can check out my skydiving video below!